Goodbye Cristina - Game Over.

[ben]

Game Over ??? a Divided country . In my building 15 floors, at midnight clapping and cacerolazos from some floors, other floors yelling Macri Vende Patria , HDP....??

The people screaming vendepatria are the most perplexing - and the most worrying. Anybody screaming that last night is a profoundly undemocratic idiot. To quote Tom Cruise in A Few Good Men, when told he's not fit to handle the defense: "You don't even know me. Ordinarily it takes someone hours to discover I'm not fit to handle a defense".

These are people for whom it's perfectly normal to root against someone about whom they know nothing. Or are they objecting to a policy or proposal of his?

And there's a huge contingent of these people. That's why Hebe de Bonafini is still around and hasn't been mocked out existence nor sacked to avoid embarrassing her group. Here's a gem of hers from this morning. This lady appears to truly think that no hard work, no aspirations of a majority of this country went into making Macri president. No, he must have won the lottery.

To me, the most potent signs of the change is the replacement of this, with this. Look at the faces of the people and see normalcy. Sanity. The spontaneous eruption of the anthem, by people who don't hate anyone - who simply love their country.

Macri may still screw things up big time. But for now, he has a huge reservoir of hope to tap into.

 

[Gringoboy]

Agreed, in the context this may have been unavoidable. I'm not trying to be too hard on Macri.

But suck it does. And that is exactly what is refreshing about what Pinedo said and how he says it. He gets it.



I wish I'd written every word in this paragraph. Agree completely.

Yeah, kudos to Daniel Scioli for being a gentleman.

 

[ElQueso]

Kudos to many of the people that Cristina "ordered" not to attend the ceremony for showing up as well:

http://www.lanacion....istina-kirchner

Varios dirigentes peronistas desobedecieron la orden de la ex presidenta Cristina Kirchner y se presentaron en el Congreso para la jura del presidente Mauricio Macri.

I had written a spiel last night about the whole "being without a president" issue last night, but I realized I never posted it because I was involved in a technical problem with work that came up last night and I never posted it.

Part of my would-be text was wondering how many would show up "in violation" of the queen's "orders". Seems to be the day is showing us possibly the actual beginning of the end of Kirchnerismo?

Also, I had a comment about the whole being without a president for twelve hours problem.

Article 93 starts off with

Al tomar posesión de su cargo el presidente y vicepresidente prestarán juramento, en manos del presidente del Senado y ante el Congreso reunido en Asamblea[...]

"Upon taking possession of his charge [or "upon assuming office" maybe], the president and vice president will give oath, at the hands of the president of the Senate and before Congress united in Assembly[...]"

I think too big a deal all around was made about this whole thing. In that, Cristina scored points for making it a big deal and Macri had to do what he did, I think, to make sure her influence was as small as possible.

But reading those words, it doesn't seem to say that Macri is not actually the president until he swears his oath. It did not seem to indicate that Argentina is in some kind of weird limbo until he swears his oath. "Upon taking charge", not "before he can take charge" or "he doesn't have his charge until he's sworn the oath" - unless there's some bit of Spanish language peculiarity about the meaning of those words which I'm missing that don't translate directly into English. In fact, it seems to me to specifically say that he already has the reigns of office in hand when he does actually swear the oath. Only Cristina (and her minions) was trying to make it some kind of constitutional crisis. As someone else mentioned at some other point - we're talking the difference between ceremony and law.

Maybe the law could be a little more clear that the incoming president has a specific time frame in which to swear his or her oaths (maybe 24 hours or something), but the people have spoken and elected a new leader (no matter who it ends up being in a given election) and Macri was indeed the president of the nation when Cristina's presidency ended at midnight last night.

 

[Gringoboy]

Anyone have any idea how many of the K block turned up in the end then?

 

[thorsten]

Part of my would-be text was wondering how many would show up "in violation" of the queen's "orders". Seems to be the day is showing us possibly the actual beginning of the end of Kirchnerismo?

I think it's a pretty good sign that Scioli showed up; and it also shows that he values good democratic behavior higher than fights between the parties.

 

[EJLarson]

I think it's a pretty good sign that Scioli showed up; and it also shows that he values good democratic behavior higher than fights between the parties.

The guy has shown himself to be a class act throughout this whole circus. That praise, from me, isn't often directed at peronists, but here's to the exception and may there be many more!

 

[ben]

Kudos to many of the people that Cristina "ordered" not to attend the ceremony for showing up as well:

http://www.lanacion....istina-kirchner



I had written a spiel last night about the whole "being without a president" issue last night, but I realized I never posted it because I was involved in a technical problem with work that came up last night and I never posted it.

Part of my would-be text was wondering how many would show up "in violation" of the queen's "orders". Seems to be the day is showing us possibly the actual beginning of the end of Kirchnerismo?

Also, I had a comment about the whole being without a president for twelve hours problem.

Article 93 starts off with

"Upon taking possession of his charge [or "upon assuming office" maybe], the president and vice president will give oath, at the hands of the president of the Senate and before Congress united in Assembly[...]"

I think too big a deal all around was made about this whole thing. In that, Cristina scored points for making it a big deal and Macri had to do what he did, I think, to make sure her influence was as small as possible.

But reading those words, it doesn't seem to say that Macri is not actually the president until he swears his oath. It did not seem to indicate that Argentina is in some kind of weird limbo until he swears his oath. "Upon taking charge", not "before he can take charge" or "he doesn't have his charge until he's sworn the oath" - unless there's some bit of Spanish language peculiarity about the meaning of those words which I'm missing that don't translate directly into English. In fact, it seems to me to specifically say that he already has the reigns of office in hand when he does actually swear the oath. Only Cristina (and her minions) was trying to make it some kind of constitutional crisis. As someone else mentioned at some other point - we're talking the difference between ceremony and law.

Maybe the law could be a little more clear that the incoming president has a specific time frame in which to swear his or her oaths (maybe 24 hours or something), but the people have spoken and elected a new leader (no matter who it ends up being in a given election) and Macri was indeed the president of the nation when Cristina's presidency ended at midnight last night.

In most jurisdictions, including the US, the outgoing president is the president until the new one takes the oath of office. It's that simple. Jon Corzine wired a lot of money in the form of "gifts" to friendly cities an hour and a half before Chris Christie took the oath of office.

That the next in line of presidential succession takes charge of the office for a few office on Inaugural Day is a concept I've never heard of in my life, and that frankly sounds strange. The president is president until the next one takes the oath. What's difficult about that? Well, in Argentina, everything; but this was solved at a cost of substantially complicating the transition process. It's not the way things are supposed to work.

Is it a constitutional crisis? Hardly. Is it the way it ought to work? No, not that either.

Does it create limbo? Well, any situation that leaves an acting president is always a bit weird. Either some disaster leaves the president incapacitated, or something planned in advance - say, a surgery. But always an issue that occurs. Never, ever, have I heard of there being an acting president in the regular course of events, as there now will be upon every handover here in Argentina. That's weird. Weird enough that had it been the intent, the Constitution ought to have - and surely would have - mentioned it.

While the K claim of acefalia is surely exaggerated - here, everything is - and maximized for political effect, I don't think it's an overstatement to say that the judges changed the law here. I actually hadn't expected the judges to do what they did.

 

[ElQueso]

You're right that it is not a normal situation. In fact, this wouldn't have been a crisis if Cristina hadn't been showing her arrogance at trying to control everything up to Macri's assumption of power itself (which she, as a president, had no right to determine - she's not the law, she's not the constitution and she had no business trying to control this).

However, I can see how Macri could easily change this in the future, create precedence and tranquility that follows the recent ruling by the judge on when the sitting president's loss of mandate takes place.

When Macri hands over the reigns to the next president, he can work with that president elect to determine where that person would like to take the oath and receive his or her "objects of limited power" and then they can center the swearing of the oaths and passing of said objects on midnight. Maybe even the new guy can start the precedent of a midnight ball to celebrate his or her assumption of power.

Just takes some clear heads with the will to negotiate and compromise. I'd think such a precedent set in the next hand-over would be very hard to break as well, given that ruling on the ending of the president's power and the near-certain lack of desire for Argentinos to have some 12+ hours without a president.

 

[scotttswan]

That the next in line of presidential succession takes charge of the office for a few office on Inaugural Day is a concept I've never heard of in my life, and that frankly sounds strange.

Wouldn't that have been Boudou?

so close...... :lol:

 

[ElQueso]

Nah, by law it's the president of the senate because Boudou lost his mandate when Cristina did.